


Cellblock D

by dramady



Category: Walking Dead (TV), Walking Dead (comic)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-29
Updated: 2012-03-29
Packaged: 2017-11-02 17:37:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,867
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/371590
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dramady/pseuds/dramady
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Two outsiders find a connection in a way they didn't seek out or expect.</p><p>CO-WRITTEN WITH PROPERNICE</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cellblock D

**Author's Note:**

> Picking up at the end of season 2 with Michonne's appearance, this hypothesizes a comic-related series of future events that are sure to be Jossed in the fall. So, in essence, spoiler for season 2 of the TV series and for the prison/Governor arc of the comic.
> 
> Disclaimer: These characters belong to Robert Kirkman. No profit is made nor sought.

That old dude can seriously saw logs. Hershel's asleep, Daryl doesn't even know where but fuck, he can _hear_ that old guy. Damn. He's got his crossbow in one arm, pistol in the other and the woman in the corner of his eye.

 _Watch her_ , Rick had whispered after shifts had been doled out. Andrea showing up dragging along the darky who had two walkers on chains. Fucked up shit, that. So here they are, middle of the fucking night and Daryl's got watch with the walker-keeper.

Doesn't it just figure. He leans against a stalled car and doesn't hide anything in how he's watching her.

Save someone’s life these days, and become the sudden loose canon. The one everyone watches. Michonne’s well aware of how this group’s leader decided to keep tabs on her, and of course he puts this asshole in charge of keeping her company all night. She’d figured Rick had more sense than that, but who knows. She’s not even sure why she’s staying in this group, other than they all ran into each other and no one told her to leave.

They just treat her like prime suspect number one instead. Never mind the fact that she hasn’t done a damn thing but help.

Every now and then, she watches Daryl watching her, pissed beyond belief. And finally, late at some point, she speaks quietly, just loud enough to be heard over the snoring old man. “I could have left her, you know. No one in your group would have ever known the difference. Seeing as how you all left her behind.”

Daryl's eyes narrow. "Didn't fuckin' leave anybody behind." He went back for Carol after all. "Why didn't you?" If she thinks she's so god-almighty. "Nobody asked you here."

“‘Cause I guess I’d hope if it was my ass, someone’d save me too. Not sure that favor would get returned at this point, seeing as how I need a babysitter.”

"Got about a hundred different directions you could go." Daryl's helpful like that. "Not like anybody's got a chain around your neck."

Michonne opens her mouth to retort, just before her eyes catch over his shoulder. Two walkers on the shoulder, and she points. Even as she does, three more move from behind a jack-knifed semi-truck. Kitana first, she crouches as she walks, deciding she’d have felt a hell of a lot better about getting to the walkers undetected if she still had her own. But that was something _Rick_ had insisted on. Never mind it’s kept her alive since the whole world went to hell.

Daryl follows, crossbow at the ready. He fires; there goes one and he has to take time to reload, not wanting to use the gun to wake anybody unless it's necessary. Unless this is the first of many.

Letting out a breath, Michonne doesn’t waste time while he reloads. One is close enough, and she swings her sword, head falling right off of its shoulders. Pulling her machete out from under her jacket, she drives it into the skull of another, then pushes the kitana through an eye socket. That leaves one more for Daryl as she makes quick work of the still biting head on the ground.

An arrow pierces the last one and down it goes. Then there's time spent retrieving his arrows, wiping them on his leg and reloading them. Then Daryl has to grudgingly admit that she's pretty good with that sword. Like hell he'll say that, though.

He’s accurate, Michonne will give him that. Silently. “Think there’s another wave coming? Should we get the group up?”

Best way to find it is to check, right? Daryl nods toward where they came from, finger to his lips. _Quiet_. Then he leads the way. Would be nice to have some light, but moon's pretty bright.

She nods and follows, both of her weapons out and ready as she stares hard in the dark. Her hood is up so that her face can’t be seen, and she follows him silently, watching her footfall, stepping lightly.

Through the maze of cars, they find one more, two more, falling dead slack to the ground, but after waiting, longer and longer each time, there aren't any more.

Daryl turns back to Michonne and nods to head back closer to the cars. Yeah, she's decent, not all whiny and useless like some of the women.

She even lets Daryl lead, but only because if they come across something in the distance, he can shoot it down. When they get back to the lookout, she wonders how this group kept it together all the way until the farm thing, but doesn’t ask. Not that question, anyway. “You all know where you’re going?” she asks quietly.

The distrust he feels is obvious and Daryl pauses before he answers with a shake of his head. "Went to the CDC." Shit, that was a bust.

Michonne is quiet for a long time, then she gestures to her left. “There’s a prison, about two miles north. All fenced in.” She looks at him. “I’ve never bothered, because there might be a group already holed up, who might not be as...nice as your group. Or it could be infested to hell with walkers, and I’m good. But I’m not that good.”

Prison - Daryl fights down the shudder. Who the hell would go to a prison?

Except that it's fenced in, walled in. If the walkers weren't all walled in with it.

But Daryl wasn't the decision maker for a reason. He'd be out on his own if that was the case, without all the baggage. "Tell Rick," he offered, shrugging.

“No use wakin’ him up now.” Michonne stares out into the distance. “We get in though, and no one else has been there? That’s ammo, non-perishables in the cafeteria. Almost guaranteed safety as long as we’re smart. Room to be outside and exercise. It’s perfect.” She shakes her head with a mirthless smirk. “Which means something’s probably fucked up.”

Without saying anything, Daryl shrugs again. It makes sense, he supposes, but he's not a big picture guy. She can talk to Rick about it. "Good if you ain't ever been in prison." Which he hasn't, but jail was bad enough.

“Used to put people in prison, before all of this,” she says, just to see what kind of reaction to that she’ll get. “Prison looks good when it’s us against this bullshit.”

"You a prison sales lady? Shit." Daryl rolls his eyes. What was she? A cop? With a sword? Who the fuck knows. Still he watches her from the corner of his eye.

Michonne just smirks but doesn’t answer. When morning breaks, she finds Rick, tells him about the prison, and it’s decided. They’ll go to the surroundings treeline first, scope it out, see if there’s movement. The whole thing has her a little edgy, just for not knowing what to expect. Walker surprises, she figures on. But it’s the human element she’s wary of.

One thing they have in common. Daryl's walking abreast with her. Somewhere down a few hundred feet is Rick and Glenn. Daryl and Michonne crouch in the underbrush looking down at the prison that looks big and concrete and claustrophobic as shit. He scowls, he can't help it.

“You don’t like this, do you?” She asks, whisper soft so as not to give away their position to any potential threats - human or dead.

"Like what? The idea of livin' in that?" Daryl shakes his head. No, not in the least. Not even close.

“Doesn’t have to be permanent. There’s gotta be....neighborhoods somewhere, right? So we stay here for now, but don’t stop looking for something better. Unless you’re thinking about leaving the group.”

"You're just full 'a ideas, aren't you?" Daryl snarks. He's had to think with her here than he usually does. "Hell if I know."

“How the fuck are you still _alive_? I get not over planning but shit.” She’s just wondering what he’s planning on doing in the winter, but a twig snaps, then the tell tale sound of a walker becomes clear, and she gestures right behind Daryl.

Turning smoothly, his crossbow up and Daryl aims and fires. The walker goes down and Daryl follows to reclaim his arrow. When he comes back, he scowls at her. "I'm alive 'cuz I pay attention. You gonna judge me? Fuck that shit." He crouches down to load his bow.

“I don’t have time to fucking judge you, calm down. I never thought that staying alive out here would include ‘not giving a shit about anything’, but hey. Whatever keeps you alive.”

She finally gets a good view on the prison, and she squints down. “A few walkers gathered up by the gates. Easy to pick off, probably.”

Daryl whistles for the others and down they go. There are walkers and prisoners, halls of cells and food, decisions of who's sleeping on what floors, about the prisoners about how to reinforce the wall.

Taking a cell at the end of a hallway, Daryl stands at the door. His skin is already crawling being inside so much concrete. He keep his crossbow strapped over his body, chewing on his lower lip.

Michonne’s cell is a few down from him, with Andrea in the middle. She doesn’t mind, but she’s not looking to make much conversation either. At least not with her. Lying on her bed, she dosn’t have to wait long for Mike’s voice to start in.

_So you’re really staying with these people?_

“They haven’t turned me away. It’s shelter, and it’s about to start getting cold outside. Too cold to stay out.”

_Find a house somewhere._

“Safety in numbers,” Michonne mutters.

_Bullshit, you just don’t want to go_

“I...don’t know what to do,” she finally admits.

There's someone standing in her doorway when she says that. Daryl is watching her sidelong, eyebrows up, but then he keeps going, pacing his way down the hall.

He barely sleeps that night. It's too tight, too close, so the bags under his eyes are a little more pronounced the next morning when they're sent out in teams to assess the wall. Daryl isn't surprised that he's teamed with Michonne again. The two outsiders? But Carol keeps _looking_ at him and Daryl just walks away.

They have to stack up bodies to be burned. Shitty, sweaty work.

Michonne gets it. She thinks it makes Rick an asshole, sticking her with this just because he doesn’t trust her, and she can’t figure out what the fuck Daryl did. But she works with him anyway, her bandana around her nose and mouth. She can tell Daryl’s tired. He’s still working decent enough, it just seems like it’s in slow motion. “You okay?”

She doesn’t really expect an answer, so she doesn’t even look up.

His own bandana over his mouth, Daryl nods. "Why?"

“You look like shit, that’s all,” she says, finally looking up at him. “I’d look like that _not_ havin’ four secure walls around me. You looked better out there,” she says, thumbing behind her in the direction of the trees.

It says something about how tired he is that he says, "grew up out there." He knows how to take care of himself. Could even take care of Merle, back in the day. But here he is.

They toss a walker on the pile and he arms away the sweat from his forehead.

Michonne can’t help but look - no matter how tired he is, his arms...she shakes her head at herself, but nods at his explanation. “Stay where you’re comfortable. Makes sense.” She gets it now, why he isn’t a planner. Because out there, it’s hard to be surprised - there are only a few things that can happen.

The stench from the burning bodies sends them around to the other side of the prison and the gate, then there's rehydrated macaroni and cheese for supper. Nasty shit. It looks like Michonne and Daryl have the 2 AM watch, so he lies down on his mattress and falls dead asleep in two minutes.

Personally, she’s just glad for the food and water. Though, she could hunt her own food and make out with more that’s better tasting. Daryl has the right idea though, and she goes to sleep right after dinner. They don’t have any real way of knowing they woke up on time, so it’s Andrea who wakes her, and Michonne goes to wake Daryl, knocking on the bars of his cell lightly.

He makes a snorting noise as he jerks to sitting. "Fuck," he mutters. And already he's getting to his feet, reaching for his crossbow. There are showers here but he hasn't gotten around it it.

They sit in chairs outside the doors of the prison building inside the gate. It's quiet.

Michonne’s sword is across her lap, and after a few minutes, she sets it down, getting out a smaller knife and a piece of wood. She just starts carving it down, making the tip pointy, not even realizing she’s making something that’s a good shape for the crossbow. She’s just always done it, even on her own, to pass the time. She’s used them to help her catch fish, in the past.

Watching her, Daryl smirks, but not derisively. It prompts him to pull out his own pocket knife and go looking for something to whittle, having to make do with a discarded piece of 2x4. regardless, he sits again and starts peeling away shavings of wood.

Looking over at him, Michonne smiles just a little. “Well aren’t we a pair,” she says, running her thumb over an edge. “If only I could find some sand paper. Make my spears smooth.”

“"Bet they have some at a store. You know they weren't stockin' up on sandpaper to fight the walkers," Daryl snorts. His carving isn't going to be a weapon; it reminds him of how he'd do this when he camped out in the woods as a kid.

“Most improbable weapon of choice: sandpaper,” Michonne laughs softly. “Sandpaper and duct tape or something.” For some reason the idea of someone having to scramble for a makeshift weapon makes her laugh more, though that probably meant some poor bastards were dead.

"Sand a geek to death." Yeah, that shit's funny. Daryl snorts, eyes on his carving. "That might be less painful than that shit we had for dinner."

“I think tomorrow I’m going out with a bag, walk a few miles and see what I find,” she says, not realizing she’d been planning that until she says it.

"That's pretty fucking stupid," he said as mildly as Daryl says anything.

“And why’s that? Seeing as how I’ve been doing exactly that for months before you people?” Michonne asks. Not defensively, just curiously.

"Lost your pet walkers for one." Daryl shrugs. So that's when he says, "need someone to go with you." Like Glenn. The idea makes him chuckle dryly again. Give the Asian credit; he can get around.

“Plenty of dead to go around,” she points out. Then, she looks at him sideways. “You offering?”

"You askin'?" Her look gets thrown right back at her.

Michonne holds his gaze for a second, then she nods. “Yeah. I am. I’d ask Glenn, but his woman seems a little...edgy.”

Daryl doesn't have a use for most of the women, so he just shrugs. Might as well go. Or miss another fun day of burning walkers. "Might as well go when the sun comes up." Wood shavings still fly around his feet.

Michonne nods, her own knife still moving. Silence lingers for a while, until she breaks the quiet. “Question. Don’t figure you’ll answer. What’s with Carol?”

For a long moment, he doesn't consider answering. His piece of wood is rounding out. "Had a shithead husband who got bit. Had - " And at that he ducks his head, "had a daughter got bit."

“Shit,” Michonne says quietly, letting out a breath. “This fucking world. Christ.” She just shakes her head and keeps going with the whittling. “Seems like she’s close to you.”

Daryl snorts again, but this time sharply. They aren't close. Or if they were, that shit was gone when Rick shot Sophia. But he won't badmouth her to someone else. Just to her face.

When the sun comes up and they're replaced, they set off toward what might be a town. Daryl's got his crossbow and a saddlebag thrown over his shoulder.

Michonne has a bag of her own over her shoulder, and she walks quietly with him, not bothering to strike up conversation because she figures if he wanted to talk, he would. She sees buildings in the distance and pauses, pulling a large bottle of water and taking a swig before passing it to him. “How do you want to do this?”

"Go in, get out alive?" That's Daryl rolling his eyes. he takes a long drink and wipes the back of his hand over his mouth. "Sounds like a good plan to me."

With a flash of a smile, she takes the water, putting up her machete and drawing her kitana. “Good a plan as any.” She likes him - appreciates him, really. They head into the town, and it’s quiet - not even a walker so far. There’s a pharmacy and she gestures over at it. Aspirin, alcohol, peroxide. There’s a lot of shit they need.

Shit's pretty picked over, but Daryl grabs bandaids (Hello Kitty, the fuck), ACE bandages and Neosporin, and holds a box of rubbers before he tosses them on the floor. It's weird that the greeting cards are still untouched.

Raiding the pharmacy, she grabs random things, recognizing some labels but staying away from the hard shit. All they need is a pill popper in the group. She remembers Lori is pregnant and grabs some prenatal something, allergy meds, and other bottles. Then, she looks at Daryl, ready to move on to a store that has food. Hopefully.

The shelves of the grocery store were ransacked but good and the stuff that's left is shit. The random can of garbanzo beans, whatever those are, the crappiest cereals, not even any Lucky Charms. Canned almond milk. Who drank that shit? Daryl stared at the can, nose wrinkled.

Michonne though, she did her time in a grocery store in high school. And if this is any kind of store, the stock room door has a lock with a code on it. Glass breaks near the back of the store, but it’s just a little too high for her to get through the window without a boost. So she hisses his name. “Daryl. Give me a leg up.” It’s eerie that her voice carries in the place. No hum of electricity, no other shoppers. No music.

So, he does, waiting on the other side of the door. "What's back there?" he asks after a second. "You find Lucky Charms back there?"

It was too much to hope it hadn’t been picked through at all. But there are enough boxes that haven’t even been opened. She grabs soap, toothpaste, toothbrushes, tampons. Then she goes to the food. “Good canned food. Soup, chili, real boxed mac and cheese and....a kid’s cereal with marshmallows. That the one?” she asks, teasing.

Everything gets stuffed in her bag, and she pushes it through the window first. Her kitana is on the other side with Daryl, and she’s startled when a walker is right in her face, coming from around a pile of boxes that had previously blocked it from view. She yells in shock, stumbling back.

"What?! What the fuck!" Daryl drops his bag and gets his crossbow in one hand. He pulls himself up enough to see, then disappears, pushing her sword through the opening. It's too high for him to shoot it.

Michonne has to double back, then grabs her sword and drives it through the walker’s head, falling back and closing her eyes, panting hard. “Fuck,” she finally breathes out, then pushes a box in front of the window and pulls herself back through kitana dropping to the ground first, needing his help so she doesn’t fall on her face.

"You all right?" He ends up with his arms around her, getting her to her feet. "Just a walker." But he's teasing, even if his expression doesn't change. He finds the box of Lucky Charms and rips into it, stuffing a handful into his face.

“Fine. Just took me by surprise.” She watches him though, a little smile tugging at her lips. “Favorite cereal?”

"This is the shit," he mutters around it, even offering her a handful. Might even have it with that fucking almond milk.

She takes some and walks with him as they leave, but on the way out, she holds up a finger walking down an aisle and grabbing something, tucking it in her back pocket. “Alright. Anything else you think we should hit?”

"Still didn't get your sandpaper." But Daryl is standing in the street popping marshmallow pieces in his mouth. "We gotta get back." To burn more walkers. He can see the smoke from where they stand.

“Or do everything the others think they’re too good for?” she asks. Except for T-Dog. He’s been helping. But apparently Lori’s too pregnant, and Andrea’s protecting them all. So who knows what they do all day. Although Michonne does like Andrea. Takes balls to make it out there the way she did.

When they get back to the prison, she presents Rick with everything, showing him the bag. It earns her a pat on the shoulder before she turns to start working again on moving bodies.

“We gotta get to the end of the pile soon, right?”

"They keep multiplyin'."

Enough that Daryl actually takes a shower that night, scrubbing the stench of the burning off him and out of his nose. He's got a different shirt on and pants as he makes his way back to their cell row.

Michonne’s had the same idea, but she’s already done showering, sitting on her bed with jeans and a tank top on. Wringing out her hair, she looks up when she hears him coming. “We have the shit watch again?”

His eyes drag over her and stop; he's slow to blink up to her face. "Yep. When you're good at somethin'. … "

“See you there,” she says, catching his eyes. Then she stands, moving in front of him for a second, in his space, lingering, before brushing past him and heading down to the cafeteria.

At two in the morning she’s there, sandpaper in her back pocket, just waiting. She walks the perimeter with him first, then they sit, and she starts whittling. She’s dressed warmer now that they’re outside, covered up.

The wood Daryl has takes a vague shape, nothing specific yet. "Weird there was only that one." One walker, all day? It wouldn't do to get complacent.

“Yeah. Maybe it’s a sign,” she says sarcastically. “But I was thinking...walkers are still made of what we are, right? Water. So if we’d freeze, they should too. Make it easier for us to go out, go further. Might thaw out in the winter, but for now...”

"They hibernate? That what you're sayin'?" Daryl rolls his eyes again. "Walker-popsicles. I say find 'em, round 'em up and put 'em in a pit and burn 'em."

“More work for us. So excited,” she smirks. Then, she reaches into her back pocket and shows him holding it between them. “Some for you, too.”

Snorting out a low, amused sound, Daryl takes it and stuffs it in his own back pocket. 

It gets cold enough later that they walk to keep warmer. There's nothing to see, though, and when the sun comes up again, Rick says they can rest for the morning, which means being back on the cellblock. Their side doesn't get morning sun and Daryl pauses at the end of the hallway. Yeah, he doesn't much like it here.

Michonne pauses beside him and realizes Andrea will be up and out, that they’ll be the only ones on their block. “You sleeping?” she asks, looking up at him.

He gruffs out a sound that says he doesn't know, even if there is fatigue around the edges before looking at her, eyebrows raised in a question.

“Could come back to my cell,” she says with a little shrug, not shy.

"Do what? More whittlin'?" He snorts before the meaning of the offer becomes clear. With that, she can see the flush on the back of his neck. "What're you doin'?" He asks voice low.

“Asking you if you want to spend the night, I _guess_ ,” she says, looking at him. “Don’t worry. You won’t hurt my feelings if you say no,” Michonne assures him before turning to walk into her cell.

It's the morning, but Daryl doesn't stress that. He watches her, how her hips sway when she walks. It feels like a trap in a way, a way to get something from him, but what, he doesn't know.

He follows her in.

It isn't romantic and it doesn't take long. He doesn't stay because if someone comes by, he doesn't want to answer the questions. But that night on watch, he concentrates fully on his whittling, the shape kept hidden from Michonne.

Michonne finishes one spear and immediately starts on another, and like she promised, her feelings aren’t hurt. Around four or so, one lone walker is walking past the fence, can’t see them because it’s so dark, and she reaches over, putting her hand on Daryl’s arm as she looks out at the dark, only able to see it because of the moon shining behind them, on it.

If he shoots his crossbow, he's out an arrow, at least until sun-up. If they fire a gun, they draw attention. So he stands, wood left in his chair, nodding at her. _C'mon_.

She gets up, following his lead, machete in hand as she follows him. She glances back at the wood, but can’t tell what it is in the dark.

The walker offers little in the way of excitement and even in the dark, they can add it to the pile. And in the morning, they're given the time off again and alone in the cell block, they strip off their clothes and meet in the middle of Michonne's cell. Daryl's hands are rough, calloused and he doesn't kiss her.

Kissing isn’t at the top of her list, it doesn’t break her heart that he doesn’t want to be close. It’s a release, something they’re both (apparently) good at. There’s no taking time, only because any time Andrea could show up, or Carl. Christ, that kid was everywhere. But little things, like Daryl’s hands feel damn good, rough and knowing, stick with her. And though she doesn’t make a move to find his lips, she does move her mouth against his neck, panting and gasping against him, fingernails digging into his shoulder.

The metal springs creak and Daryl curses the sound. He holds his weight on one elbow, her hip, he grips with his other hand, as he strains into her, pushing up into her body.

Gasping quietly, Michonne moves with him, rocking up against him, making sure she stays quiet. The only sound is the springs, and the sound of their hips. Her grind against his, muscles tightening around him, trying to keep the sound down. But it’s been a long time, and she’s wanted him for a while. It doesn’t take her long to come around him, pressing her forehead against his shoulder.

When it's over, he doesn't get up right away, lying on his back. When he does sit up and reach for his clothes, he looks over at her. "You on somethin'?"

He didn't ask before.

“You don’t have to worry,” Michonne says as she pulls back on her tank top. “Can’t happen.” She doesn’t say anything about it, not elaborating. “You’re not gonna start avoiding me now are you?” she asks with just a little hint of a smile.

"No," he scoffs. It's impossible to avoid someone here. Place is too small, people too clingy.

He pulls on his clothes and goes out to help burn bodies. Might as well do something useful.

A few days later, there's a small wooden rabbit, carved and sanded, left on Michonne's pillow.

Michonne’s exhausted when she comes in, but she takes the time to joke with T-Dog for a little while before she heads to the showers. When she comes back to her cell, she sees the rabbit and doesn’t know what to say at first. But she picks it up, thumb stroking over the smooth wood. She smiles to herself, until Mike’s voice interrupts her thoughts.

_You know he doesn’t give a fuck about you. He’s just bored. What else is there to do?_

She closes her hand around the wood for a second before going down to Daryl’s cell, standing in the entry way and speaking quietly. “Thank you,” she says, opening her hand to show the rabbit. “It’s good. Really good. Better than my spears.”

The color spreads from the back of Daryl's neck up to his hairline and down to his chin. He shrugs a little, looking away, still sitting on his bunk. His hair is still wet from his shower too and he's tired. It takes a lot time to raise his gaze up to hers.

For the first time in a while, Michonne is speechless. It’s been too long since the world went to hell and she had anything to call hers that someone actually gave her. Took time to make sure she had something nice. Walking into his cell, she sits next to him, close enough that their thighs and shoulders touch. “Never would have guessed this is what you were working on.”

Another one-shouldered shrug. Daryl reaches out, turning the rabbit in her hands to show the back where he'd nicked too deep when he'd been whittling. It isn't perfect. "Was makin' somethin' like this for Sophia." But she'd turned out to be dead, hadn't she?

All of them have lost a lot; too much, and she looks at him, searching his face again before leaning in to kiss him, quickly, a brush of her lips and gone. But simple gestures like this go a long way, and she looks back down at the rabbit before standing. “Now what are you going to do at two in the morning?”

"Wish I was sleepin'." But Daryl's eyes are on the rabbit, not on Michonne. His shoulders move again. Maybe he'll try his hand at a deer, or a tree. A Cherokee Rose.

It's time for dinner, for sleep, then for watch. It's getting colder, harder to sit still. Daryl paces, bored and tired, crossbow strapped across his back.

Really, they’ve been lucky all this time to not have more than one random walker here and there during watch. Maybe it’s the cold, making them all walk together as a herd, but the sounds come first, carrying and echoing, and Michonne stands, seeing a group of about twenty outside the fence, moving to it, pressing against it, and she looks at Daryl, wondering what he wants to do about it.

"Shit," he grumbles then he looks at her, full on, eyebrows up in question. Wake the others? Take them on themselves? Twenty is a lot. "I'll go get Rick," he decides a second later and the group is up and mobilized, taking out the herd with no casualties, just more bodies to burn. Where there are twenty, though, who knows how many are behind those and the mood in the prison changes. Maybe they were getting complacent, maybe they were getting lazy, either way, there's no whittling for a while, right through to where winter sets in as much as it does in Georgia. Daryl even wears a hat, one with a ball on top and ear flaps. Fuck you, it's warm.

Michonne’s been tense since then, wondering now when the other shoe’s going to drop. She has a few warm things she managed to get, going back into town with Daryl again and grabbing what was quick and easy. She can’t do bulky and still fight well, so she just does the best she can and it works out well enough. But truth be told, she’d meant it when she said the prison could be a stop gap for her, for all of them, and that they could find something better, more normal, somewhere else. After all, further in, the town had to give way to houses at some point. She decides to keep the idea to herself, though Daryl, she has a feeling, will want her to go check things out with someone watching her back.

Going to his cell after a couple hours sleep, Michonne knocks, then speaks. “Think I want to go out and see what’s beyond town. Maybe find a few houses.”

"Time to settle down?" Daryl smirks, but he doesn't say no.

He can't go - they need him to help reinforce the fence. But Rick decides to go, and takes T-Dog with him. Daryl watches Michonne leave, giving Andrea a short answer when she asks what he's doing. It doesn't feel right. But since when does anything?

He goes back to work.

Except that almost ten days later, Rick and Glenn come back alone. Lori's been annoying as fuck wondering when they're coming back and that doesn't help Daryl's mood in the slightest. He'd headed out a few times but the snow had erased their trail. And when Rick comes back with only one hand, all hell breaks loose anyway.

As soon as Michonne saw the Governor, she knew it was bad news. Then came the bullshit with the walkers versus humans, and these people were so damn brainwashed they let it happen. All in exchange for some false sense of safety. It’s her mouth and resistance that gets her locked up with that asshole, and even after she gets free thanks to Glenn, she holds back. Goes to the Governor’s house herself, then finds T-Dog.

It’s slow going back to the prison, having to support him, fighting the cold and walkers. But somehow they make it and she yells up at Andrea who opens the gate and lets them in. Michonne doesn’t talk to anyone, just goes to her cell and sits in the dark, closing her eyes.

There'd been some choice words when Daryl had heard about Michonne's return. He barreled off the grounds and all but runs to their cell block where he skids to a halt at her door.

Shit.

He ends up waffling from foot to foot as he finally says, "hey."

 

Michonne looks up at him, relieved to see him but not moving. The rabbit he carved for her is in her hands, and she’s turning it over and over again. “Glad you didn’t come,” she says, truthfully.

Coming into the cell, head down, Daryl sits next to her, watching her hands. "Yeah?" Rick had lost a fucking _hand_. That's some messed up shit there. It couldn't have been good, not by a long shot.

When Michonne looks up at him, she opens her mouth, almost speaking, but then she doesn’t, just shakes her head. “Guy was pitting humans against walkers.”

At first, Daryl doesn't even think to get mad. It just makes no damned _sense_. Didn't when Rick explained it either. "He hurt you?" he asks, voice low.

Months of walkers, and months of death and rot, she’d never been hurt. Not like this. But she’s not about to feel sorry for herself either. “I hurt him back.”

There's a lot in those words. That she was hurt, that she got revenge. Daryl approves; it's his way. "You need tendin'?"

“It’s nothing that can be fixed,” she says low, looking at him, searching his face for understanding.

He has to look away at that, down at his feet. Yeah, he gets it. Doesn't mean he has to like it. Means they did some serious messed up shit. Worse than a hand being cut off, that's for damned sure.

“I’ll be okay. Just...glad to be back. Rick okay?” If he got an infection, he’d be fucked. Suddenly she’s glad they got the supplies they had, back on one of their runs into town.

"Be jerkin' off left-handed the rest of his life." Which means he'll be fine. When Daryl says that, he realizes how tight his jaw's been.

He tells her not to move, goes to get her water and some food, some cookies from the cafeteria stash and he sits with her through the night. Andrea looks in once, then leaves them alone. He sits, back against the wall, knees drawn to his chest, near the door. Anyone coming in has to get by him.

Michonne has no idea how long she’s been asleep when she wakes up with a strangled yell, that’s somehow muffled for how startled she is. She remembers that Daryl’s still there, and she’s grateful and glad, but she quickly forces herself to calm down and breathe. Her hands are shaking a little, but she just lies back down, concentrating on getting her breathing under control.

She can feel the mattress depress as Daryl sits and he hums out a sound so she knows it's him, his hand petting gently on her hair. But he doesn't say anything. After all, what's there to say?

After a while, she falls asleep again, and the next night, she asks him to stay. The third night she doesn’t even say anything. She just knows he’ll be there. But soon enough they go back to sitting on watch together, and after, when the sun has just barely come up, Michonne reaches down into her bag that she had when they went into town, and pulls out a small, travel sized box of Lucky Charms.

“Was saving this for you. So you didn’t eat them all in one shot.”

Daryl doesn't smile (he never smiles). But he takes the box and holds it as if weighing it in his hand. It was with her the whole time she was gone, having fuck knows what being done to her and she has this.

He wants to shoot something, rip the guts out of something. His muscles cord and he thinks about throwing the box across the edge and shooting the shit out of it for good measure.

He gets as far as standing up, but he can't do anything else. His life never had any room for "sorry"s or regret. He stands there unmoving.

For her part, Michonne has no idea what the fuck is happening, and she just looks up at him. “...Don’t like cereal anymore?”

The box crumples in his hand as Daryl shakes his head. He likes his cereal just fine. "What happened to that guy?" The man who.did that to her and Rick.

Michonne hasn’t wanted to think about what she did to him. She’s almost afraid of it, afraid of what he’ll think of her. So, she lies. Doesn’t tell him everything. “Arm for an arm.”

She doesn't know him very well yet. But that statement is somewhat reassuring. "Is he dead?"

“Be surprised if he lives, since we have their doctor,” she says of the woman who came back with Rick’s group. She looks down, speaking slow. “I’ve never felt sorry for myself. Not during this whole thing, not after...” She trails off and can’t look up at him. “I still _don’t_. But I can’t get this off of me.”

If it was him, Daryl would beat the shit out of something and beat feet out away from anybody who knew. "What is it?" He asks almost compulsively. It's like picking at a scab til he finds out what's underneath.

Michonne doesn’t know if she wants to be this open with him yet. If she can. If he even wants her to. She finally stands and shakes her head. “You’d think when something happened to me, it would have been by one of _them_. Instead it’s someone keeping his dead daughter in the bedroom, feeding her _parts_. He made me feel different. And I hate it.”

"What d'you wanna do?" Daryl asks and it's an offer as much as a question. He'll go if she wants, stay if she wants. That he feels that way doesn't surprise him. It just is.

“You staying is good.” She looks at him, and for the first time, maybe there’s a small, small bit of vulnerability. But she’s moving inside before she gives away too much. She showers first, then grabs something to eat before going to her cell. She’s tired, but doesn’t even lay down until Daryl’s there.

He lies on his side, an arm around her waist. If they were to talk about it, who knows what he'd say. But his hand covers her chest over her heart, feeling the steady beat under his hand.


End file.
